


Understanding

by sussexbound (SamanthaLenore)



Series: The Homecoming [9]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Animal Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Grief/Mourning, Jealousy, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, dog attack, reference to major character death that has already occurred in the past
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-24
Updated: 2014-07-24
Packaged: 2018-02-10 07:20:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2016054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SamanthaLenore/pseuds/sussexbound
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John’s face stretches into a smile that fades again, just as quickly.  “It just comes like that, sometimes—all of a sudden.  You don’t expect it.”  He murmurs against Sherlock’s skin.</p><p>“What does?”</p><p>“Grief.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Understanding

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks again for reading this series. I'm so glad that you are enjoying it.
> 
> This story can be read alone but it means a lot more if read in the context of the entire "The Homecoming" series.
> 
> The case at the beginning of this story is adapted from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Adventure of the Copper Beeches", though the location of the action has been changed from Hampshire to Sussex to meet my needs.

John’s hand is rock steady as he aims his British Army Browning L9A1 at the Mastiff’s head and pulls the trigger.  Fortunate for Mr. Rucastle, who would likely be dead if not for John’s well-honed reflexes and presence of mind.

The poor dog was half mad with starvation and Sherlock can’t help but think that it was Rucastle more than the Mastiff who deserved the bullet.  But John wouldn’t approve him voicing such thoughts, so he holds his tongue.  

Rucastle’s likely suffering enough anyway.  The dog practically tore the man’s hand and leg off before John ended the attack.  Even now that the dog is a bloody heap on the grass, Rucastle’s shrieks and moans of pain are still piercing through the late afternoon stillness of the front garden—thoroughly unsettling.  John attends to him with his usual, detached, medical efficiency.  

Sherlock is more concerned with Violet Hunter, who is standing beside him, eyes wide, shivering in shock.

“You should sit down,” he offers.

“You,” he addresses the housekeeper scowling by the steps to the veranda.  “Go get Miss Hunter some chamomile tea.”  

He leads the girl to a wicker chair near the window, and she sinks gratefully into it.  “Thank god you came.”  Her voice is anything but steady.  She is staring at her employer writhing and moaning on the lawn.  “I—I should have known better than to take this job.  The money, though.  I needed the money, and I thought I could handle it.  I’ve encountered strange requests, difficult families before.  I’ve managed…”  She is muttering almost to herself.

Sherlock kneels down, blocks her view of the grisly scene in the garden, and puts his hands gently, but firmly on her upper arms.  She looks at him.  “It’s not your fault.”

She smiles weakly.  “I really should have known better.”

“No,” he repeats.  “It’s not your fault, and if not for your presence of mind, for the observations you made, and the information you gathered before John and I even got here, it would have taken a lot longer to bring all this mess to a close.  You did well, Violet.  Really well.”

She nods and forces a smile.  “Thanks.”

John has joined them on the veranda now.  There is an ambulance and police cars.  Sally Donovan is there.  Her division now it seems.  Rucastle’s daughter was a cold case.  She had been missing for two years, and all this time locked away in her father’s attic like an animal.

“I should have known you two would end up with your noses poking about in this case somehow.”  Sally sounds irritated, but less so than usual.

“Sally.”  Sherlock motions for her to join him the other side of the veranda, and she follows without looking the least bit happy about it.

“John called us,” she announces, feeling the need to explain her presence, Sherlock supposes.

“Good.”

She frowns.  “We need you to file a report and we need to question the nanny.”

“There’s a child around here somewhere, too.” Sherlock adds, suddenly realizing he hasn’t seen the miserable little creature since the confrontation in the house earlier.

Sally nods.

“Go easy on Miss Hunter.  She’s—she’s shaken.”

Sally’s face is a mask of bewilderment.   “Since when do you care about a random human being?”

Sherlock glares and Sally drops her eyes, looks away, over to the young woman sipping tea with trembling hands.  John is speaking to her now.

“How’s John?”  Sally sounds sincere.

“He’s fine.”

“And you?”  _Unbelievable._

“Fine.”

“Greg’s been asking after you.  You’ve not been answering any of his emails.”

“We’re busy.”

Sally nods and stares around at the ruckus on the lawn.  “Yeah, so it seems.”  She clears her throat, glances down at the white, painted floor boards of the veranda.  “Listen, I uh—I haven’t seen you since—since everything happened.”

“No.”

Sally’s eyes meet his.  She smiles tightly.  “I’m sorry—sorry about what happened to your brother.”

Sherlock looks away, and swallows dryly.  “It wasn’t your fault.  You were barely involved.”

“No, but—well, I wish things could have ended differently.”

Sherlock doesn’t know what to say.  _Where is John?  Why isn’t John here to explain what on earth has gotten into Sally Donovan.  That is what John does.  That’s his job!_

Sally just nods once more, when Sherlock says nothing.  “Yeah, well, I just wanted to say it, and now I have so…”

“Thank-you,” Sherlock replies stiffly, because the whole situation is horrifically awkward.

“Listen, you and John can go.  We’ve got this.”

“Yes, I think we will.”

John is staring at him from across the veranda.  He looks…  

Sherlock suddenly realizes he has no idea what the look on John’s face means.  But surely John must be tired, hungry.  

They need to go back to the inn.

 

* * *

 

John is quiet over his meal.  

The pub at the Tiger Inn is small, cramped, just a few tables, and hardly any patrons.  It is early, really; more tea than dinner time.  But Sherlock is glad for the lack of people, the silence.  

He feels off in ways that he can’t really define.  His head feels busy and blank all at once, like it is trying to access files for which the directory has been changed.  His whole body aches from the adrenaline crash. 

“What were you and Sally talking about?” John finally speaks.

“The case.”

“That all?”

Sherlock clears his throat, stares across the room at a family entering with two screaming children in tow.  _So much for silence…_   

“Mycroft.”

“You and Sally were talking about Mycroft?”

John is clearly surprised.

“She felt it necessary to—express her condolences.”

John takes a sip of wine, grimaces a little as he swallows.  “Well, that was— _nice_ of her.”  

“It was bizarre.”

John lets out a small huff of laughter.  “Yeah.  That too.”

Sherlock tears his eyes away from the people across the room and turns his attention fully back to John.  “Thank-you for today.”

John smiles.  “For what?”

“Taking care of things, with Rucastle, the dog.  Keeping your head.”

John nods, takes another sip of wine. “That’s what I’m here for.”

 _Eyes relaxed.  Breathing even.  Hands steady.  Fine—John seems perfectly fine._   

“And you’re alright?”

“Yeah.  I’m good.  I’m fine, Sherlock.  I told you I would let you know if I wasn’t.”  John takes a hearty bite of the roast beef on his plate, and stares down at Sherlock’s fingers tapping erratically on the table top.  His eyes narrow a little.  “Are _you_ alright?”

“Fine.”  But, Sherlock doesn’t feel fine.  He’s tense, slightly on edge.  He fidgets with the cuff of his shirt just under the table, can’t seem to sit still.

“Have some wine,” John offers.

“I don’t want wine, John.”  He’s much shorter than necessary.

“Okay.”  John’s voice is steady, but he looks concerned.

The family chooses this moment to enter the pub proper.  One of the children is still squawking, the other is sniffling piteously, and as they past their table, it is clear he also needs his nappy changed.

Sherlock drops his fork to his plate with a clatter and glares at them as they pass.

John presses his foot against his ankle under the table.  “Sherlock…”  It’s a warning.  

And then, after a beat.  “Come on.  Let’s go back to the room.”

“You’re not done eating,” Sherlock snaps, eyes still focussed on the invading nuisance.

“I’ve had enough.”

John calls over a waiter, declines their offer to pack up his left overs, and then they are leaving.

 

* * *

 

It’s better back in the room.  Someone has lit a fire in their absence, the beds are neatly made, small, wrapped breath mints on the pillows.  

John draws the curtains.  “Are you tired?  You want to nap?”

“I’m not a geriatric, John.”

“No.  Never said you were.  But it was kind of a trying case today.”

John flops down on one of the single beds.  “Come here.”

“Why?”

“Because you look like you need to.”

“I’m fine!”

“Then why are you pacing like a nervous groom?”

Sherlock stops.  “I’m not.”

“Well, you’re not now.”  John chuckles.  He pats the small slice of mattress beside him.  “Really, Sherlock.  Come here, okay.”

“No.”  Sherlock turns away, because he’s only hurting John with his coldness, and that’s the last thing he wants, but something has set him off, and he doesn’t know what, or why, but…

“Is this about Sally mentioning your brother, do you think?”

And Sherlock goes and sits cross-legged on the floor in front of the fire, back to John, because he doesn’t know, doesn’t know anything.  He can’t look at John, he’s out of words, and there are small loose threads in the carpet there, threads around holes burnt by wayward coals.  He pulls at them, twists them around his finger, stares into the flames.

John is blessedly quiet.

Sherlock longs for numbness, for anything to stop the internal noise.  He thinks about the fleeting calm of nicotine.  He thinks about the blessed, weighted blanket of morphine.  

Sally always throws him off, but never like this.  

His brain is racing, racing, looking for what?  The case is over.  Everything is resolved.  This is when he should be high on success, not drowning under the flood of—well, of whatever this is.

His skin buzzes with irritation.  His head aches.  And things are slipping a little sideways somehow, everything a little off.  The small clock on the mantle is invasively loud.  _Should remove the batteries._   There is a tag in the side seam of his shirt which is suddenly glaringly evident.  _New shirt.  Stupid.  Should have checked before putting it on._ Even the firelight hurts his eyes.  _Not good._   

He knows well enough that none of these are good signs, but there is nothing to be done, and John is—John is breathing, behind him, yes.  And John is warm, and steady, and a nice weight when settled on top of him, and it might be nice, yes, to accept his offer from before.  

But how to accept now he’s declined?  To get up, to walk over, to strip bare and get John to do the same, to sink into all that John offers?  How?  Because it’s too late for words, and John is cross.  

John doesn’t deal with this well.  It’s not supposed to happen around John, no matter what he’s said of late.  Proof?  There is precedent.  The Baskerville case.  John hurt, angry.  Understandable.

Sherlock buries his head in his hands, pulls on his hair hard.  The pain is overwhelming, but if it will just knock him over the edge then everything can reset, and John won’t have to see.  John doesn’t need this.  No.  He needs Sherlock to be steady, sure, certain, something he can rely on after everything.  Not this.  Not—not this.

“No.  Sher—Sherlock, stop.”

John’s hand over his, trying to pry his fingers loose from his hair.  

He swats it away.  Doesn’t John know not to touch.  He told him.  Told him!

John let’s go.  “What do you need?”

_Nothing.  Nothing.  Go away._

“Sherlock.”

“GO AWAY!”

John blinks.  Looks a little stricken.  

_Out loud.  Shouting.  Not good._

John takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly.  “Okay.  I can leave.”  He gets to his feet, heads for the door, but then hesitates and turns back around, hand still on the nob.  “I can leave, or we can—we can try something different if you like.”

“What?”  Sherlock somehow manages, but it’s bitten off, short.

“Come to bed with me.  Not sex.  Just bed.”

_Maybe.  Yes.  Could be nice.  But—words to reply—need to…_

John is looking at him, waiting.

“No clothes.”  All that comes out.

John smiles softly and nods.  “Yeah.  Okay.  No clothes.  Come on.”

He gets up somehow, and John knows, and John undresses quickly, and then undresses him as well.  Into the small bed, together.  The sheets are soft: 600 thread count at least, Egyptian cotton.  _Good.  So soft.  And John.  Warm.  Strong.  Just the right weight, and…_

 _Yes…_   

John settles on top of him, pulls the coverlet up over their heads until they are cocooned in warm, dark, silence with only the sound of their mutual breathing and heartbeats.  John is very still, very quiet.  He settles his head against Sherlock’s chest, just under his chin, and just breathes.

Sherlock’s brain goes white.

 

* * *

 

When things start to trickle back into his awareness, it is John’s breath against his skin he notices first.  Deep and even.  John is asleep.

Sherlock wraps his arms around him, pulls him closer, and John stirs just a little, but then settles again.  

It’s hot and humid from their breath under the blankets.  He reaches up and pushes the coverlet back a little.  

It is dark behind the curtains.  They’ve been here in the room several hours then.  

Sherlock’s muscles burn.  He needs a bath, but the inn is ancient and there is only one bath to the inn’s four rooms.  Not worth it.

Here.  He’ll just stay here with John.

“Sherlock?”  John’s lips brush against his skin.  

“Yes.”  _Oh!  Words.  Good._

“Feel better?”

“Mmm.”

“I’m going to move, okay.  My arm’s asleep.”

“Mm-hm.”

John rolls off of him, sits up and rolls his bad shoulder a little.  John stares down at him.  The room is dim with the meager light being given off by the embers in the fireplace, but Sherlock can still see the sincere concern in John’s eyes.  It twists in his gut and makes him feel ill.

“Can I touch you?”

Sherlock nods, and John reaches down and brushes the hair away from his forehead.  “You okay?”

He wants to say yes, and thank-you, and you were perfect, better than perfect.  But he still doesn’t have enough words yet, and there are tears apparently.  John’s brows knit.  He lays back down, rolls on his side and wraps an arm around Sherlock’s waist.  He doesn’t say anything, which is good.  

More time passes, but Sherlock cannot tell how much.  John does not fall back asleep, but he doesn’t move, doesn’t speak.

Finally, “Sally meant well, I think.”

“Probably.”

John’s face stretches into a smile that fades again, just as quickly.  “It just comes like that, sometimes—all of a sudden.  You don’t expect it.”  He murmurs against Sherlock’s skin.

“What does?”

“Grief.”

“Grief?”

“You don’t think that was what this was about?”

“Grief about what?”

John lets out a small huff, possibly of frustration, possibly of disbelief.  Sherlock is too exhausted to try and suss it out.

“About your brother.”

“Oh.  I don’t—we never got along, John.  You know that.”

“Yeah.  I also know that you adored him, and he adored you.”

Sherlock feels like he is going to cry again.  It’s ludicrous and he doesn’t want to.

“We don’t have to talk about it.  But it’s okay to feel it, Sherlock.  Okay?”

“I know it is!”  _Snapping at John again.  Not good._

“Okay.  I’ll stop.”

“Sorry.”  He breathes.

“It’s alright.”  John’s arm tightens around his waist.  “Maybe just sleep, yeah?”

“Yes.  Do you want your bed back?”

“No.”

“Okay.”  Sherlock turns, tucks his head under John’s chin.  He smells clean, with just the slightest tang of dried sweat.

John’s palm presses slow, firm circles against his lower back.  Sherlock hums in contentment.

“That good?”

“Mmm.”

Other than the creaks and groans of the old inn around them, the night is remarkably quiet.  East Dean is a small village, the kind that shuts down early and stays that way until dawn.  There is something appealing in it.  

Sherlock has always been an urban creature, always needed the constant flow of a large city’s energy to match his own, to make him feel balanced somehow.  But the quiet here is welcome.  It settles him.  It helps unwind the tension in his chest and the static in his brain.

“We could stay.”

“Huh?”  

He feels John tilt his chin down to look at him.  

“Here.  For a few more days.”

“Do you want to?”

“Might be—pleasant.”

He feels John’s mouth stretch into a smile against his hair.  “Yeah.  It might.”

“They’re not busy.”

“No.  It’s pre-season and the middle of the week.”

“We could keep this room?”

“Probably, yeah.”

“Let’s stay until Friday.”

John smiles again.  Presses his lips to the top of Sherlock’s head.  “Sure.  Let’s”

 

* * *

 

It’s early.  The sky is still silver-grey in the pre-dawn light, but Sherlock is awake somehow, slouched in the passenger seat of their rental car, a paper cup of hot tea clasped in his hand as John drives the narrow lanes of East Dean toward Birling Gap and the sea.  

The Seven Sisters should be seen at sunrise, John had insisted the night before, and Sherlock had grudgingly agreed.  Only because John had seemed so thoroughly excited by the prospect.  But now they are here, together, headed off toward the iconic chalk cliffs, and John looks so contented, so truly happy, that Sherlock feels that perhaps the idea was rather brilliant after all.

John glances over at him.  “You awake yet?”

“No.”  He grumbles.  Best to let John know that this early hour is an exception, that he has no intention of making a habit of rising before the sun.  Sherlock sips at the tea.  It’s bracingly hot and sweet, just as he likes it.  It helps.

John just smiles and turns his attention back to the road.  “It will be worth it, trust me.  I can’t believe you’ve never been.”

“Why would I?”

“Why wouldn’t you?  Sussex is gorgeous.”

Sherlock sighs and takes another sip of tea.  He watches the green fields, dotted here and there with sheep, sail past outside.  “Janine Hawkins bought a cottage around here, somewhere.  I think it might have been West Sussex, though.”

“Friston,” John mutters tightly.

“Friston?  That’s just a stone’s throw from the inn.  Wait—how do you know that?”

John’s jaw is clenched tightly.  “I just do.”

Sherlock stifles a smile and takes another sip of tea.  “We should look her up.  Last I heard she’d decided to keep the bee hives and her Setter bitch had had a tryst with the Lab up the road.  She was saddled with a whole litter of pups.” 

John’s face has gone quite red.  “And how do you happen to know that?”

“She texts sometimes.  Usually when she’s drunk, or bored, or both.”

“What?”  John’s tone is bordering on dangerous.

“Relax John.  It’s just Janine.”

“I know it’s Janine!” he snaps.

Sherlock raises a brow.  “Problem?”

“Uh—yeah.  A little bit.”

Sherlock straightens up in his seat.  “Seriously?”

John is silent.  But his hands grip the steering wheel so fiercely his knuckles are white.

“Are you still upset about that?”

Silence.

“Why?”

“You did kind of sleep with her.”

“So?”

John’s face deepens from red to purple.  “SO?!”

Sherlock sighs.  “I was trying to convince her that I was crushingly sad and in desperate need of companionship.  I had to at least make an effort to make that story believable.  Co-sleeping seemed a happy medium.  It wasn’t as though we did it often.  Most of the time I was…”

“I’m not talking about co-sleeping, Sherlock.  I’m talking about sex!”

Sherlock nearly spits out his tea.  It takes him several seconds to stop coughing before he can form a reply.  “Wh—what? 

John just looks confused.

“As in sexual intercourse?  As in me and Janine?”

“You did propose.”

“Yes.”  Sherlock has no idea how these two things are connected in John’s mind, but somehow they are.  John keeps glancing over at him, away from the road, eyebrows raised in a look that seems to say: _how thick can you possibly be?!_

“John, the night we—when I told you I’d not done that before, was there a part of that that wasn’t clear?”

“You didn’t sleep with her?”

“Euphemisms are boring, John.  Say what you mean.”

John sniffs, twists his hands against the steering wheel.  “Fucking, Sherlock.”

“No.  I didn’t engage in sexual intercourse with Janine.”  Sherlock wrinkles his nose before taking another sip of tea.  He shakes his head and scowls at the thought.  “Really John, I expect more of you.  The things you assume…”

“But you were going to get engaged?”

“To get into Magnussen’s office.  I thought you understood that.”

“Yes, but—you were at a point in the relationship, fake or not, where she didn’t think it out of place that you should propose.”

“I suppose.  I did have to make it convincing.”

The grey expanse of the sea appears on the horizon, cut along one side with a swath of white.  Sherlock points.  “Look.  There they are.  They look like cliffs to me, John.  Weren’t they supposed to be—impressive or something.”

John sighs and slows to pull into a small, rough overflow parking lot that’s been set up near the side of the road.  It is completely empty.  He takes the first space available and shuts off the engine.  

Sherlock unclips his seatbelt, and fumbles around in the backseat for his coat, but then realizes that John isn’t moving.  “What’s wrong?”

“Most people have sex before they get engaged, Sherlock.”

“Do they?”

John huffs out a small laugh.  “Yes.”

“Oh.  Well, there was only so far I was willing to go—even for a case.  No need to get carried away.  Most of what you saw the day you brought me back to the flat after the drugs incident was for your benefit anyway.”

John had been staring down at his lap, but his head snaps up at this.  “What?”

Sherlock shrugs.  “I called her up and asked her to coffee a week or so after your wedding.  Her idea, really.  She assumed from—something I said at your wedding that I was in love with you, that I might be upset, lonely now that you were married.  I let her think what she wanted.  She was the one who suggested you might have feelings too, might be jealous if I were to have a relationship of my own.  She was more than happy to play along for my sake.”

John’s jaw is hanging open.  He says nothing.  Incapable, perhaps?

“Well, I—I thought, why not.  It made her feel like she was contributing to my happiness, which furthered my cause, and I was…”  Sherlock suddenly realizes that perhaps something of the scheme was, in some way, more than a little _not good_.  “Uh—I’m realizing now that this sounds…”

“You _tried_ to make me _jealous_.”  John bites out each word like poison.

“Well—you say tried… I did rather succeed, didn’t I?”

John’s eyes are narrowed, his mouth a tight line.  He clenches his jaw.  He sniffs.  He nods his head, once, curt, and then gets out of the car, slams the door, and starts marching toward the trail head that leads to the beach.

Sherlock blinks, turns, watches John’s retreating form with a small twist of panic.  He hurries out of the car, locks it behind him and then rushes to catch up.  “John!”

John doesn’t answer.  Just keeps walking.

“John.”  He’s caught up now, he’s having to walk fast to match John’s pace.  And still John says nothing.  He just keeps heading for the beach.  They reach the wooden stairs at the top of the cliff, and John practically runs down them.  Sherlock follows in silence.

The beach is completely abandoned.  There are small, dark dots of people walking along the cliff tops a good half kilometer down, but other than that they are completely alone.  

“John,” Sherlock tries, and this time reaches out to grab his arm.

John whirls on his heel.  “You put me through all that.  You made me feel, so…  Just so you could, what?  Feel powerful?  Get your kicks?”

“What?”

“Why would you do, that Sherlock?!  Why would you even once think that was a good idea?”  John turns and starts walking away again.

“I was angry!”  And suddenly he is, all over again.  Still too raw from yesterday.  No control.  And John being so—so unreasonable, so difficult.

He stops, turns back around.  “Angry?”

“At you.  Yes.”

John opens his mouth, takes a breath as if about to speak, but then closes it again.  He shakes his head and stares out at the water for a moment and then back at him.  “For what?”

“You left me!”  Sherlock’s voice breaks, and he should be ashamed, but he’s too overwhelmed to care.

John reels slightly.  The words seem to hit him hard, and Sherlock realizes too late that he is trembling, pale.  His eyes are red.  When he finally speaks it is broken, dry, and barely audible against the rush of the surf.  “You left me first.”

Sherlock doesn’t know what to say.  Sorry has never been enough.  It never will be.

John takes a few deep breaths, straightens his shoulders, and turns as though he means to walk away again, but he turns back, stays where he is.  “I’m not your plaything.  You don’t just get to toy with me, use me, however you please, Sherlock.”

“I—I know you’re not.  I don’t…”

“No more trying to make me jealous.  No more drugs in my morning tea.  No more using me for experiments without my knowledge.  None of it!  I need to be able to trust you, and I—I’m finding that really difficult right now.”   

Sherlock stares down at the stones beneath their feet.  He nods.

John looks out over the water.  A small sliver of fire is just starting to peek over at the edge.  The sky is brilliant rose.  “The sun’s coming up.”

“Yes.”

He looks over Sherlock’s shoulder, and points.  “Look at that.  See.  What did I tell you.”

Sherlock turns around and yes, John was right.  The white chalk of the cliffs seems to glow in a hue to rival the sky, pale shell pink, a perfect contrast to the gold tipped waves below.  Beautiful.

John appears at his side.  His hand meshes with Sherlock’s, who stares down at it, and then back up and into John’s eyes.  

John forces a small, fond smile.  “I love you, you know.”  His hand tightens around Sherlock’s.  “You’re just a real dick sometimes.”

Sherlock tries very hard to bite back the smile he feels threatening, but John sees it, and smiles a little wider.  “So, was this worth getting up early for?”

“The cliffs, or being accused of being a dick?”

John huffs out a small laugh, and smiles crookedly.  “You are a dick.  But, I’m talking about that.”  He nods toward the walls of chalk which seem to get more brilliant by the minute.

“Anything’s worth it if it means being with you.”

John looks up at him.  There are other people joining them on the beach, now.  A couple walking their dog, a family, small children already gathering stones from the surf-line into small, red buckets.  A group of tourists with cameras just descending at the base of the stairs.

And John kisses him, on a beach full of people, without a second thought.  He gets on his toes, slides his hand around the back of Sherlock’s neck and kisses him soft, and slow.  

It’s a shock and an unexpected delight.  John has never done anything so bold, and Sherlock is surprised to find that it means more to him than he could ever have imagined.

**Author's Note:**

> Note: I've had a couple of questions regarding references to Mycroft's death in this chapter. No, his death has not been mentioned in any previous stories in this series, but vague references have been made to it, as well as references to Sherlock's grief. One example is in the bathing scene in "Recovery" there is this:
> 
>  
> 
> _“I threw tantrums when I was very small according to My…” and he chokes on his brother’s name. Feels that same tightness start to creep into every muscle._
> 
>  
> 
> _John’s eyes slide open, he glances up through his lashes. “Hey, you don’t have to talk about it. Really. It’s okay. If it’s too…”_
> 
>  
> 
> _“It’s fine.”_
> 
>  
> 
> _One of John’s hands slides over his knee under the surface of the water, stops, rests there with comforting pressure._
> 
>  
> 
> It really isn't something I've delved into too deeply at this point, as I've wanted to keep it purposefully vague and keep the focus more on John's grief in the beginning. The circumstances surrounding Mycroft's death are likely be mentioned in more detail in a later installment. As will Sherlock's attempts to deal with his grief over it.


End file.
